Essential Research: 59-41

The latest Essential Research survey has Labor’s two-party lead at 59-41, up from 58-42 last week. Also featured are approval ratings for the Prime Minister and Opposition Leader (both up solidly from six weeks ago), respondents’ self-perceptions of their employment and salary outlooks, Kim Beazley’s appointment as ambassador to the United States (54 per cent approve, 18 per cent disapprove) and Brendan Nelson’s appointment as ambassador to the European Union, Belgium and Luxembourg (49 per cent approve, 22 per cent disapprove).

Also:

• Newspoll has published its quarterly geographic and demographic analysis breakdown of federal polling results. Possum notes it shows up an intriguing divergence between city and country, which he says “could well be explained by the Coalition line on the ETS”. I might suggest that the largely forgotten Gippsland by-election of last June offered a premonition of this.

• About 200 local Liberal National Party members will vote for a candidate to succeed the outgoing Margaret May in the Gold Coast seat of McPherson on Saturday. Noses have been put out of the joint by the fact that the position was advertised on Thursday, one day before the closure of nominations, which has been universally interpreted as an attempt to assist Peter Dutton in his bid to move to the seat from notionally Labor Dickson. Glenn Milne in The Australian reports that May urged Dutton to nominate for the seat, somewhat deflating the notion that federal divisional council chair Karen Andrews might benefit from being her reported ally. Another of Dutton’s three preselection rivals is Minna Knight, a former staffer to Joe Hockey and Julie Bishop. Milne says Knight has the backing of state Currumbin MP Jann Stuckey, whose husband Richard Stuckey withdrew from the race last week. Rounding out the field is Wayne Black, of whom nothing seems to be known. Despite earlier reports, twice-unsuccessful state Burleigh candidate Michael Hart has not nominated. Tanya Westthorp of the Gold Coast Bulletin reports local members are “threatening to revolt” if the state executive overturns the result of their ballot, as seems likely if Dutton doesn’t win. Andrew Fraser of The Australian notes the local party’s history of rebuffing imported candidates with reference to the 1998 preselection, when former Brisbane lord mayor Sallyanne Atkinson finished sixth in a field of 23.

• The ABC reports that Queensland’s conservatives will soon reach a decision as to whether their federal election candidates will stand as Liberals and Nationals, Liberal Nationals, or the “LNP”.

• AAP reports speculation that Jodie Campbell, federal Labor member for the ultra-marginal Tasmanian seat of Bass, might not contest the next election. Campbell has been in the news recently after her partner was charged with assaulting her, and two of her staff members abruptly and mysteriously resigned. The AAP report notes she “has been moved from her much-televised seat in parliament behind the prime minister”. Geoff Lyons, electorate officer to Senator Helen Polley and an unsuccessful state candidate from 2002, is mentioned as a possible replacement.

• Michelle Grattan reports in The Age that former tennis star John Alexander, who made the final six in Saturday’s Bradfield preselection, is “volunteering” to take on Maxine McKew in Bennelong. Others who have been mentioned in the past are Melanie Howard and former state MPs Kerry Chikarovski and Andrew Tink, all of whom have been ruled out, and former rugby union international Brett Papworth.

• Phillip Coorey of the Sydney Morning Herald reports Pfizer executive David Miles will challenge Bill Heffernan for the second position on the New South Wales Liberal Senate ticket. Incumbent Connie Fierravanti-Wells is expected to hold the top position. The third will depend on whether the state Liberal and Nationals can smooth over tensions and reach their usual joint ticket arrangement, in which Nationals Senator Fiona Nash would take the third position.

• Phillip Coorey also reports it is “rumoured” that Noel McCoy has nominated for preselection against Philip Ruddock in Berowra, despite announcing in late July that he would not do so.

• Sue Neales of The Mercury reports Tony Mulder, police commander and Clarence council alderman, has emerged a surprise winner for Liberal preselection in the state division of Franklin. The Liberals are considered all but certain to increase their representation in the five-seat division from one seat to two at the election next March, with incumbent and party leader Will Hodgman assured of re-election. The party hierarchy is apparently keen that the second seat be won by Jacquie Petrusma, who was Family First’s Senate candidate in 2004 and 2007 and came close to winning a seat on the former occasion at the expense of Christine Milne of the Greens. Also on the ticket are Clarence City Council building inspector David Compton and Huon Valley small business owner Jillian Law. Vanessa Goodwin was earlier considered to be in the box seat, but she has since found a place in the upper house after winning the Pembroke by-election on August 1.

• In a short but eventful article, Imre Salusinszky of The Australian reports that Mark Sheridan, neurosurgeon and director of surgical services at Liverpool Hospital, has nominated for Liberal preselection in the outer-southwest Sydney state seat of Menai, held by Labor’s Alison Megarrity on a margin of 2.6 per cent. It is also “understood” that National Rugby League chief operating officer Graham Annesley has again nominated for Miranda in southern Sydney, where he fell 0.8 per cent short of defeating Barry Collier in 2007; that Hawkesbury mayor Bart Bassett has again nominated for the north-west Sydney seat of Londonderry, where Labor’s Allan Shearan defeated him by 6.9 per cent in 2007; and Randwick mayor Bruce Notley-Smith has nominated for the inner eastern Sydney seat of Coogee, held for Labor by Paul Pearce on a margin of 7.3 per cent.

• Ben Raue at The Tally Room is constructing what promises to be a superbly comprehensive guide to the federal election post by post.

• Keep following the action at my regularly updated posts on the Bradfield federal by-election and Willagee state by-election in Western Australia.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

983 thoughts on “Essential Research: 59-41”

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  2. Actually I found on wiki this bit about how Godfrey Phillipp’s role as being the mastermind behind the ALP”s It’s Time Campaign may have been the reason why the show was axed – possible Political Interference and an early example of it being “Their ABC and almost exactly mirrors the axing of The Glass House in the dying days of the Howard Govt.

    The show’s axing, announced in mid-1972, was highly controversial — not least because it was replaced by the American program Sesame Street — and an unprecedented flood of public protest ensued. A group of MPs headed by David Kennedy launched a “Save Adventure Island” campaign during which questions were asked in Parliament. However the campaign was unsuccessful and the final episode, number 1175, aired on December 22, 1972. Godfrey Philipp had been the mastermind behind the Australian Labor Party’s successful “It’s Time” campaign, which in 1972 brought about a change in government in Australia for the first time in 22 years, so the decision to cancel Adventure Island may have been politically rather than economically motivated.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_Island_%28TV_series%29

  3. Ahh, The Libs have form in pressuring their ABC to drop programs such as “Our Man In Canberra” being dumped and the “Yes Minister” Character being rewritten as a business man.

    Three episodes had been completed at a cost of $30,000, and another $10,000 had been spent on publicity when the brakes were applied. During rehearsal for episode four, and less than two weeks before the scheduled screening date, the Deputy General Manager of the ABC, Dr. Clement Semmler, announced that the programme would not go to air. In late May the Commission resolved to defer the series.4

    The ABC had received legal advice from the Federal Attorney-General’s Department that Our Man In Canberra was in breach of Section 116 (2) of the Broadcasting And Television Act. The Act stated that ‘the Commission or a licensee shall not broadcast or televise a dramatisation of any political matter which is then current or was current at any time during the last five preceding years’.

    Panic. The ABC publicity department immediately contacted all media outlets asking them to dump the Humphrey Sullivan election campaign press kits they had sent out.

    Pandemonium. The matter was discussed in Parliament. It was the last days of the McMahon Liberal Government, and the Federal election was only six months away. Labor Senator Doug McClelland (later Minister for the Media in the Whitlam Government) asked who ordered the cancellation of the series, and Labor MP Bill Hayden accused the Liberal Government of using the Act as “a political cudgel.”5

    Speculation was rife that the series was covertly scuttled by the Government because it satirised politicians generally, and Liberal politicians in particular. Prime Minister William McMahon was asked by Actors Equity if his Government had ordered the cancellation – he denied it. ABC Chairman Robert Madgwick and General Manager Talbot Duckmanton stood before the Senate Standing Committee on Education, Science and the Arts, and both denied charges of political pressure.

    Open letters circulated amongst ABC staff, some based on fact, some on suspicion, but all deploring the circumstances in which the show was cancelled. Writer John O’Grady was amazed: “Being talked about in Parliament, as if I were trying to bring down the Government, was quite extraordinary.”6

    A second, independent legal opinion was sought: M. H. Byers QC advised that Our Man In Canberra was not in breach of the Act, and therefore it would not be illegal to screen it. Senator McClelland told ABC staff that he hoped to see the series under a Labor Government.

    The December 1972 election saw the Whitlam Labor Government swept into power, and the fate of Our Man In Canberra was reconsidered. The new Attorney-General, Senator Lionel Murphy, saw a special screening, and it appears he was not too keen to have the programme aired. It was apparently thought that there could be too many repercussions from any volatile backbencher or from the DLP (Democratic Labor Party) in the Senate. Murphy shoved the whole problem back in the lap of the ABC, saying that the Government refused to give any opinion on the showing of the series.

    http://www.classicaustraliantv.com/omc.htm

  4. From today’s Oz (can’t get link happening, it’s on the front page of the electronic version):

    Majority of Liberals oppose ETS plan

    MALCOLM Turnbull will be forced to stare down more than two-thirds of the Liberal back bench if he proceeds with his plan to negotiate with the government over amendments to the emissions trading scheme before December’s Copenhagen climate change conference.

    The Australian can reveal that two-thirds of his back bench disagree with the Opposition Leader’s plan in what looms as a serious blow to Mr Turnbull’s capacity to negotiate in good faith.

    Over the past four days, The Australian contacted all 59 Liberal Party backbenchers in the House of Representatives and the Senate, asking: Do you think the opposition should negotiate amendments to the ETS with the government ahead of the Copenhagen conference?

    Only 12 MPs said they supported Mr Turnbull’s decision to negotiate, while 41 wanted the opposition to either not negotiate at all or to do so only on the guarantee that the legislation would not be passed ahead of the Copenhagen conference in December. Six MPs were either unwilling to disclose their position or unavailable.

    Three times as many House of Representatives MPs do not want to negotiate at all (21-7) and when the data are broken down to include only marginal-seat MPs, 11 out of 15 MPs don’t want to negotiate.

  5. Commissar Gillard was on Alan Jones this morning. She seemed perfectly at ease answering Alan’s questions. Makes me wonder why Rudd hasn’t conjured the cojones to go on.

  6. The developing theme emerges…

    Gerard Henderson is the latest protagonist:

    Rudd changed the world order, says Rudd – and compliant media
    … Rudd’s achievements in Pittsburgh are real enough, but they build on what had gone before.

    What was impossible just a few months ago, a product of Rudd getting too big for his boots, wet-dreaming about his influence on others when he should have been at home fixing hospitals or interest rates, a pointless quest undertaken by a truant Prime Minister… is now the inevitable result of Howard and Costello’s foresight.

    It’s only the sycophantic press, obsessed with Rudd Love that makes it seem like Kevin had anything to do with it.

    No biggy.

    http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/rudd-changed-the-world-order-says-rudd–and-compliant-media-20090928-g95c.html

  7. Interest rates will always be lower under a Liberal government… except when they need to be higher so they can be er… lower later on, but not too low… I mean… not so low as to make them high… but of course they’re… high… but they’re really low… Awww… the OO explains it all:

    John Howard surplus helped: Glenn Stevens
    THE Howard government’s good management of the budget and Australia’s good luck to go into the crisis with rates that could be cut a long way have helped it to sail through a deep world recession, suffering only a mild downturn, according to Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens.

    That’s the summary.

    What Stevens actually said was:

    “… monetary policy could be eased significantly, without taking interest rates to zero or engaging in the highly unconventional policies that have been necessary in some other countries.”

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26138980-5013871,00.html

  10. Majority of Liberals oppose ETS plan

    Well of course they do! Is there anyone who’s surprised to hear that? For ages I’ve been waiting for them to come out and admit they either do no believe in AGW, or they don’t want to do anything to mitigate it. Between the Liberals and the Nationals, the Coalition is the headquarters of climate change laggards and outright deniers. They don’t want to rock the boat of the rapacious capitalism on which their parties depend for political and financial support.

    If they’d wanted to do something about an ETS, they had more than enough time in government to demonstrate an intent.

  11. Not just Gerard either, Michael Stutchbury in the Australian …

    Stutchbury is setting himself up to look like an economics genius. Every single article he writes predicts that… wait for it… just a second… boom-tish!!!… interest rates are sure to rise.

    Can you believe it? Reduced to record lows as a result of the GFC, lower than John Howard could even dream of, an economy recovering requiring normality to be restored… now Stutcho tells us rates are gonna rise? Brave prediction. this guy is out there isn’t he?

    And when they do…

    Will this be the end of Rudd?

    Oooooo…. Aaaaaah….

    And what about the sun: will it also rise tomorrow?

    Read Stucho’s daily column to find out….

  13. From Gartrell’s article:

    In their article, Matthew Franklin and Samantha Maiden claim “public support for Labor has plunged in regional Australia and fallen in Kevin Rudd’s home state of Queensland”

    As I pointed out in #39, “plunged” is the word Tony Jones used last night on Lateline.

    Has our Tone been drinking the same Kool Aid as Sam and Matty?

  14. This stuff almost makes me hope Milne, Shanahan and co still have jobs just after the next election, so that I can read their explainations of the result. Almost…

    Then I realise that they will probbaly blame it on a compliant media allowing Rudd to “con” the Australian electorate into believing it was Labor that avoided the recession.

    For the Liberals, it was the recession they had to have. But they didn’t get it, despite a cynical combination of fear mongering, blocking, delaying and denying. They’re gone.

  16. BB

    Its noble of you to dissect that tripe for those of us with too delicate stomachs to read it. You must feel like the journalistic equivalent of a public health worker.

  18. Not Hugh Riminton on Ten.

    I’ve always admired Hugh Riminton. Back in the old days when he did Nightline (on Nine) he was a shining beacon of objectivity.

  19. Then I realise that they will probbaly blame it on a compliant media allowing Rudd to “con” the Australian electorate into believing it was Labor that avoided the recession.

    Paradoxically, Shannas has been copping it from his bloggers lately… for being a Labor stooge.

  20. I recall discussing Indigenous blindness rates with Fred Hollows when he came around to survey the Indigenous community I was working in at the time. I am sort of glad that Fred is not around to note that the situation has not changed all that much in 30 years. It was a national disgrace then, and it is a national disgrace now.

    More recently, it is yet another failure of the Howard/Costello Governments’ so-called ‘practical reconciliation’.

    It is good to see that the Rudd/Gillard Government has allocated specific line item funding to address the sight gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people.

    It is actually an area where targetted funding can make a huge, cost-effective, practical difference very quickly.

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26139133-23289,00.html

  21. GP @ 55

    Don’t know, but one reason might be that Rudd is more careful about over-exposure than Howard.

    Howard used to do all that stuff incessantly. I thought at the time that one of the reasons why people turned off Howard was that he suffered from over-exposure. He turned into a bit of a bore.

  22. From an ABC article:

    Finance Minister Senator Helen Coonan says there still a case to wind back stimulus, with the economy now in recovery.

    “[Mr Stevens

    clearly enunciated that the peak of the stimulus – the efficacy of the stimulus has passed,” she told ABC 2 News Breakfast.

    “It’s passed, because the emergency is no longer with us.”]

    It’s passed because that was how it was designed, not because it’s efficacy is wearing out, and not because the emergency is over.

    What I am doing? Worrying about what the Great Hasbeen, Coonan is saying?

  24. It was always going to be a risky move to choose as chief cc negotiator a person who does not subscribe to AGW theory. But, oh dear:

    “It is obvious to everyone on our side of politics that this is an emissions trading scheme, in its current form, that will cost jobs and will see industry close and move overseas,” Mr Macfarlane told ABC Radio.

    “On that basis, I’m not surprised to see such strong opposition from the backbench.”

    But while everyone in the coalition would prefer the legislation not to come before parliament until after Copenhagen, the prime minister was vowing to rush “headlong into this” so the coalition had to negotiate.

    “I’m being pragmatic and I’m being open with everybody,” Mr Macfarlane said.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/liberal-backbench-against-negotiating-with-labor-on-emissions-trading-scheme/story-e6frf7l6-1225780706557

  26. Shannas has been copping it from his bloggers lately… for being a Labor stooge.

    BB perhaps we should all make nice comments on Shanna’s blog site. Might make ‘limited news’ realise that if he remains fair and balanced he might get more than the rednecks clicking on his blog.

    Saw Helen Coonan on ABC and Agenda this a.m. Her take is that she sat through the WHOLE 2 HOURS with Glenn Stevens and she knows better than Glenn Stevens what he said. He said according to Coonan, wtte, that interest rates and taxes are going to go sky high shortly if Labor doesn’t stop that truly wasteful spending. What a bore that woman has become’. She is just as factually unbelievable as Joe Hockey.

    But, of course, she wants to the spending to stop so that her side will have lots of money to promise more of that nice welfare at the next election – you know, the stuff that is never means tested. It’s much more fun than wasting money on bridges, ports, communications, etc.

  27. Making Macfarlane shadow for ETS negotiations when he is a declared climate denialist, while passing over Hunt, who actually wrote his thesis about an ETS for Australia, is the clearest sign yet of Turnbull’s total impotence within his own party. He is being dragged by the denialists into rejecting the CPRS, when he knows they are wrong, and when he also knows it will lead to political disaster, yet he can’t take a stand against them.

  28. THE nation’s final budget outcome for the 2008/09 year was a deficit of $27.1 billion – better than previously forecast – the Government has revealed.

    This was a $5 billion improvement on the $32.9 billion deficit forecast in the May budget.

    The better-than-expected result reflected lower-than-anticipated spending of $2.2 billion and higher cash receipts of $2.8 billion.

    http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,26140504-5006301,00.html

  29. psephos,

    Perhaps giving Rudd a DD trigger is the best option for Turnbull. Rudd is unlikely to call on an election (DD or otherwise) until the second half of 2010. Therefore, Turnbull stays in the game for the time being. “We tried to talk sense, but the Government wouldn’t listen”. “Bring back the legislation after Copenhagen”, etc

  32. MALCOLM Turnbull will be forced to stare down more than two-thirds of the Liberal back bench if he proceeds with his plan to negotiate with the government over amendments to the emissions trading scheme before December’s Copenhagen climate change conference.

    If this is the case Turnbull is doomed. Opposition leaders can’t ignore 2/3 of their backbench.

  38. Commissar Gillard was on Alan Jones this morning. She seemed perfectly at ease answering Alan’s questions. Makes me wonder why Rudd hasn’t conjured the cojones to go on.

    Self-respect?

  40. So 32.9 – 27.1 = 5.8, but 2.2 + 2.8 = 5… so what happened to the other 800 million??

    Grog (84). Glenn is calling for a Royal Commission. He reckons Kev spent it on a new hairdryer, a piss-up at the Scores Club, a service and new tyres for the ute, bribes to those people overseas who said nice things about him and a new library of books on how to swear properly in ocker.

  43. 2GB is “Radio Liberal Party”, not one announcer on the station could be described as either left-wing or even centrist/unbiased!
    Jones I don’t listen to out of principle, and he’s very predictable anyway, much like his colleagues Hadley, Smith & Morrison.

  44. On the (downward) revised debt level, at the ABC news site it is interesting that the moderator started off the comment section with the question “are you comfortable with Australia’s debt level?”
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/09/29/2699366.htm

    What a meaningless comment. Glen Stevens has already said he’s comfortable with it. How many people actually understand what our debt level is per capita? Given that ours is one of the lowest debts in the OCED, if we aren’t comfortable, imagine how the rest of the world must feel.

  45. The World Today points out that this is the first budget deficit for 7 years. Yes, that’s right, the last time the budget was in deficit was 2001/2 when the Liberals put the budget into deficit by spending too much.

  47. Yes, that’s right, the last time the budget was in deficit was 2001/2 when the Liberals put the budget into deficit by spending too much.

    Given their propensity for big spending and cutting personal taxes, only the mining boom saved the Liberals from running deficit after deficit in their last years in office.

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